Entrez Pubmed problems

Which Web browsers will work with PubMed?

PubMed has been tested on the following browsers although other versions may work without difficulties:

Browsers that have been exhaustively tested:

* Windows: IE 7.0, IE 6.0, Firefox 2.0, Opera 9
* Macintosh: Safari 2.0 on OSX 10.4, FireFox 2.0 on OS X 10.2-10.4, Opera 9
* Solaris (Sun OS 10): FireFox 2.0, Opera 9

Browsers that have been tested and seem to work reasonably well:

* Windows: FireFox 1.5, SeaMonkey 1.1.2, Netscape 8.2 & 9.0
* Macintosh: FireFox 1.5, iCab on OS 9 (with some problems)

Browsers that do not work well and should be upgraded:

* Windows: Netscape 7.2, Mozilla 1.7, IE 5.0, IE 5.5 SP2
* Macintosh: Safari, all pre 2.0 versions, Mozilla 1.7, IE (Microsoft no longer supports Macintosh IE, please try another browser such as Safari, FireFox or iCab)


I'm getting error messages when I try to use PubMed.

Please see the information about browsers and also ensure your browser and any servers you go through are enabled for Javascript (scripting), cookies, pop-ups, and HTTP 1.1 when you are using PubMed. Also, nlm.nih.gov should be considered a trusted site by your system(s). You may have to delete your browser's cache (temporary files) before trying again.

Correction: You're right Wolf: I did reproduce the problem, and it persisted after I did what the FAQ told me to do and emptied the cache, allowed pop-ups, etc.

I have written to the PubMed helpdesk. Until they respond, I'll use the text-only version, which works fine.

Still, you managed to reproduce the problem? What did you do to reproduce it?

Dear helpdesk --

I can't seem to use your default homepage with Firefox 2.0.0.6 under Windows XP.

I visited that page, (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=pubmed), entered a search term, and pressed the "Go" button. Nothing happened. No list of articles, no error message -- just nothing. At least two people I know have encountered the same problem with the same software configuration on different computers.

According to your FAQ, Firefox 2.0.x is one of the browsers that "have been extensively tested". You didn't explicitly /say/ the tests were positive, but I assume they were. Although the next entry in the FAQ probably doesn't really apply (as I said, I didn't get any error messages) I made sure pop-ups were allowed, my cache was empty, JavaScript was enabled, etc. I did all the other things the entry advised me to do, too.

It didn't change the result.

Under Internet Explorer, the site works well, as expected.

Some more notes you may find helpful in prioritizing and fixing the problem:

* the text-only version works fine under Firefox. The problem is the default site, which I suspect might some IE-only scripting magic for its buttons. Also, its XHTML code contains no less than 36 errors, according to the World Wide Web consortium's validation service. Here's the URL.

http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov%2Fsites%2Fentrez%2F&charset=%28detect+automatically%29&doctype=Inline&group=0


* the "go" button isn't the only thing on the default site that fails under Firefox. So does the "Contact the Help Desk" link. Not only does the main site have a bug for Firefox users, the bug also makes it impossible for users to /report/ the bug from the main site. One can reasonably expect the bug to be underreported considering its severity.

* The text-only site does not contain a "contact the helpdesk" link on its main page. To reach this link, users have to click their way through the "help" page first. Admittedly, this is not the same bug. But it /is/ one more hoop to jump through before users can report it, and further reason to expect the bug is seriously underreported.

Thank you for considering this bug report. I hope I have given you the information you need for a speedy fix.

Best regards

-- Thomas <last name>

EDIT: Ha! Even the help form doesn't work. Better send off an e-mail instead...